


Mistletoe Is His Weakness

by Flyingintospace



Series: Beantown Bakery [4]
Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Not Hockey Player(s), Cafe AU, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-08
Updated: 2018-12-08
Packaged: 2019-09-14 13:09:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,988
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16913433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Flyingintospace/pseuds/Flyingintospace
Summary: Everything seems to be going wrong at the Beantown Cafe today.





	Mistletoe Is His Weakness

Zdeno huffed out a sigh, throwing the letter that he had just opened onto his desk. He couldn’t believe that the owners of the building were raising the rent yet again. He didn’t know how they could keep doing this to them. He had been saving money, trying to get enough to buy the building but now he was going to have to cut into his savings. Or he was going to have to find another location to move the shop. And he really liked this location.

*******

 “What the...” Patrice trailed off smiling at the woman and her young daughter, as the till completely frizted out. This was a new till system that had worked fine until today, when of course Patrice had a huge line up and two missing co-workers. Pasta had went to go find doughnut boxes what felt like forever ago and Charlie had just not shown up, leaving him and Brad manning the front.

“Just a second,” Patrice said, poking at the screen when everything went dead with a loud fizzle.

Patrice jumped back away from it. Now what was he going to do?

He shared a look with Brad who was making drinks, who shrugged at him.

Brad handed over the drinks to the waiting customers. “Try unplugging it?” Brad asked.

“I’m so sorry,” Patrice apologize to the unamused customer, as he ducked down, unplugging the till and plugging it back in again.

Nothing happened.

The line was beginning to get grumbly, and Brad making a quick decision, announced, “Drinks on the house until we get the till fixed.”

Patrice gave him a look.

And then he noticed a scowling Zdeno standing by the wall.

Brad grinned.

Zdeno motioned for him to come with him. Leaving Patrice all alone.

********

“You can’t just decide these kinds of things!” Zdeno growled at Brad. “There was how many people in that line? Who now aren’t paying.”

“So you would have rather they just stand there until they leave?” Brad argue back. “At least this way they’ll maybe come back again!”

Zdeno took a deep breath glaring at Brad. But then he sat back down in his chair. “You’re right,”

“I am?” Brad was surprised. He had had a lot of arguments with Z over the years and while he was sure he had won a few, Z had never admitted it so fast.

“Just go help Patrice with the line up and I’ll call someone to fix the till.” Brad eyed his boss but wasn’t going to argue the point and hurried out of the office.

*********

David was sure that he had seen the doughnut boxes down in the creepy storage room in the creepy basement yesterday but today he couldn’t for the life of him find them anywhere. He had been searching for them for at least fifteen minutes and he really needed to get back. With a shrug he headed for the basement stairs, only to see that door that was at the bottom of the stairs was closed.

That was weird.

He shrugged again until he got to the top and discovered that the door would not open. He pushed and the tried using his shoulder to shove the door open but it was not budging.

So he tried a different tactic. “HEY! HELLO! SOMEONE HELP!” He shouted pounding on the stuck door.

********

”Thank God that’s over,” Patrice shook his head. He unplugged the till again and plugged it back in to no result.

“We should put up a sign saying cash only,” Brad muttered searching for some paper, when the bell above the door jingled.

Patrice looked up hoping it was someone to fix the till but instead his eyes widened as their missing barista, Charlie, hobbled in. He was balanced on crutches with Jake hovering near him, holding open the door.

“What happened?” Brad exclaimed abandoning his quest, to hurry over.

“He sprained his ankle,” Jake said. “He’s supposed to be staying off it but he insisted on coming in.”

“How did you sprain it?” Brad asked.

Jake helped him over to the couch by the fireplace.

“We went skating last night,” Charlie sighed. “Spent like all night in emergency.”

“Why are you here?” Patrice asked.

“I can still...” He trailed off at Patrice’s raised eyebrow. “I’m sure there something I can do right?”

“I’ve really got to get to work,” Jake said. “Are you going to be all right?”

Patrice looked at the two of the fondly, they reminded him so much of him and Brad.

“He’ll be fine,” Patrice nodded.

“I even have something you can do!” Brad came over with some paper and a marker. “We have no till and we need a sign saying cash only.”

“I’ll see you later,” Jake pressed a kiss to the top of Charlie’s head and hurried out of the coffee shop.

Just as a loud crash came from the kitchen, causing all three of them turn and stare in surprise.

“Think he’s all right...” Patrice asked.

“You should go check,” Brad suggested.

“Where is Pasta?” Patrice suddenly asked, wandering off.

“Guess that means I’ll go check,” Brad rolled his eyes. “Do not get up. You call me if anyone comes in.”

Charlie nodded, getting to work on his sign.

While Brad approached the door to the kitchen.

********

Nothing was going right!

Nothing!

Tuukka had had a new recipe that he wanted to try, one for red velvet crinkle cookies but so far he had burned two batches of them and had just managed to dump a whole container of salt into his chocolate peppermint muffin recipe. Which was now dripping down the wall from where he had thrown it.

Tuukka went to go grab another bowl, to start over when he noticed the kitchen door ajar and Brad peering inside.

“What?” He growled.

“Everything all right in here,” Brad asked.

“No,” Tuukka answered.

“Anything I can do to help?”

“No.” Tuukka said.

“All righty then,” Brad disappeared from sight.

But unfortunately the interruption was long enough that Tuukka forgot about the third batch of crinkle cookies in the oven...

*******

Patrice couldn’t find Pasta anywhere. The door leading down to the basement was open and light was off so he couldn’t be down there. He was just about to go see if Z had seen him when the smoke alarms began blaring for not the first time today. He sighed, knowing that he should go make sure that everything was okay.

Smoke was billowing out if the kitchen and he hurried in to find Tuukka dumping yet another tray of cookies in the garbage, waving a towel about trying to clear the smoke.

Patrice retreated from the kitchen before Tuukka could notice him, back out into the till area.

Charlie was coughing from the smoke and Brad was headed to the front door to open it.

Patrice was just glad there were no customers sitting in the cafe at the moment.

Brad had just about reached the door, when it swung open and in stepped a tall dark haired man, with a dark full beard and an odd confidence about him. The man caught sight of Brad, still heading for the door and glanced up to the ceiling for reasons that were unclear to Patrice.

And then as Brad got near enough, the stranger swooped in, catching Brad in his arm and dipping him down to kiss him passionately on his mouth. Brad let out a squeak and flailed about.

Charlie’s eyes were wide, mouth having dropped open a bit.

“What the hell!” Patrice surprised himself as he realized he spoke out loud.

The stranger finally released Brad. “Hey Marchy,”

“Segs!” Brad shoved hard at the man who still had his arms around him. “Get off of me.” But he said it without much conviction and Patrice was not amused.

He headed around the counter for the two of them. He stopped just in front of them, as Brad finally escaped from “segs”.

“And who would this be Bradley,”

“Hey coffee boy. Get me a latte will ya,” The very annoying stranger requested. What had he just called him?

Patrice took a step forward when suddenly Brad was in between him and the stranger. And out of the corner of his eye he saw that even Charlie had gotten to his feet.

“Sit back down,” Patrice ordered. Glad to have a distraction.

“Patrice this is Tyler. We were together for a while. A long time ago. Long, long ago,” Brad introduced, keeping himself in between the two.

But before he could introduce Patrice, Tyler interrupted with a laugh. “We were more then just together. Which is why I’m here actually. We need to talk. And how about that coffee?” Tyler “smiled” at Patrice.

“Please,” Brad said, his hands against Patrice’s chest. “I’ll get rid of him.”

Patrice glared at Tyler but nodded heading back over to the counter as Brad grabbed Tyler hauling him over to the far corner of the cafe, where even Charlie wasn’t going to over hear them.

Patrice glared at the two of them as he went through the motions of making a latte, even if it was subpar by the cafes standards, when Tuukka stepped out of the back.

“Oh...” Tuukka said. “Of course. It all makes sense now.”

“Who is he?” Patrice hissed.

Tuukka sighed and Patrice thought he was just going to disappear back into the kitchen. But then he said, “Tyler Seguin. Back when it was just the three of us, Z, Brad and I, he was the love of Brad’s life. They were crazy about each other, for each other and more then a little crazy when they were together. I think the day Tyler disappeared was the best thing that ever happened to Brad. He was a train wreck when they were together. You have no idea how much you’ve changed him.”

Patrice blinked at him. “Then why’s he here now?”

“That’s a good question.” Tuukka said.

*******

“Why are you here?” Brad demanded as he dropped into the couch across from Tyler.

“I don’t know? Missed you? I was in town?” Tyler shrugged.

“Sure,” Brad gave him a look. “You’ve been gone for how many years and you just decided to show up now. Why are you here?”

Tyler sighed and pulled an envelope out of his coat pocket. “You remember that trip to Vegas? The one where we...”

“Yeah, you told me you took care of that,” Brad cut him off.

“I lied,” Tyler smiled at him.

Brad rolled his eyes, cause of course he had. “So what’s that?”

“So who’s the coffee boy?” Tyler asked instead of answering.

Brad stared at him. “Patrice. His names Patrice. And I’m pretty sure he’s my soulmate.”

An actual smile curled Tyler’s lips. “I think I found one of those.”

“Then what the hell was that when you came in?” Brad smacked Tyler’s leg.

“There was mistletoe hanging above the door. You know it’s my weakness,” Tyler answered.

Brad had totally forgotten that he’d hung that there.

Patrice interrupted setting the latte in front of Tyler. He did not look happy. And Brad didn’t know how to fix it. Not that he wasn’t going to try though. “Hey,” Brad said, catching Patrice’s hand and tugging him down on the couch next to him. “Ty, this is Patrice. You know the soulmate we were talking about.”

Patrice gave him a surprised look. “And you two dated each other.”

“We did more then that,” Tyler said, throwing the paper that he had onto the low table separating them. “I want a divorce for Christmas, Marchy.”

Patrice twitched. “You want a what?”

The bells rang above the door as a customer came in.

“We are so talking about this later.” He said as he got up to go help the customers.

Brad gave Tyler a look. “Was that really necessary? You know you could have faxed me that right?”

“I could have but I wanted to make sure,” Tyler said, taking a drink of the latte and wrinkling his nose at it. “You make money off these?”

But before Brad could protest, Tyler continued. “So will you sign them? Cause I’ve actually got to go meet Jamie here in a few minutes.”

Brad scrutinized his old acquaintance’s face. It felt so long ago that he had been in love with him. And he could honestly say he didn’t have those feeling any longer. He reached out picking up the papers. “I’m only going to sign these if you promise to bring this Jamie by.” Brad said.

Tyler, had taken another drink of his latte, grimacing once more. “Oh yeah, for the excellent coffee?”

Brad smirked. “I promise the next one will be better. And I’m not sure if you actually want to keep drinking that...”

Tyler gave his coffee cup a suspicious look and pushed it into the middle of the table as Brad fished a pen from his apron pocket.

Tyler had his phone in his hand and was typing quickly. “Fine, he’s just outside in the car anyways.”

“You left him sitting outside in the cold?” Brad gave Tyler a look and he scribbled his signature onto the papers.

“The car was running?” Tyler protested.

Brad noticed him eyeing the cup of coffee and pulled it farther away as he finished signing the papers. “Let me go make you a different one,” Brad said, standing up.

The bells chimed above the shop door and in stepped a man that Brad somehow instantly knew was Jamie. It didn’t hurt that Tyler’s entire face lit up and he headed straight for him. As Tyler got closer, Jamie wrapped his arms around him, kissing him.

Brad headed behind the counter, dumping the coffee into the sink and eyeing Patrice and Tuukka who were watching the whole production.

“Is he leaving?” Tuukka asked.

“I wanted to meet his new guy first,” Brad answered, starting on a fresh latte.

Patrice still didn’t look amused.

“You noticed the mistletoe?” Tyler said as the two of them pulled apart.

“I noticed something,” Jamie responded, with a look.

Tyler just grinned at him and grabbing his hand, pulled him over to the counter.

“Tuukks!” Tyler exclaimed, noticing the baker for the first time.

Tuukka just narrowed his eyes at him. “Let me know when he’s gone,” he said, disappearing into the kitchen.

“I see you have lots of fans here,” Jamie commented.

But Tyler didn’t seem fazed. “Jamie, this is Brad. And this is....” Tyler struggled to remember his name and the look on Patrice’s face clearly said, “Call me coffee boy one more time...”

“Patrice,” Patrice said, holding his hand out to Jamie. “Nice to meet you,”

Jamie shook his hand.

“Can I get you anything?” Patrice asked, finding Tyler’s boyfriend a lot less annoying.

“They claim to have the best lattes in Boston,” Tyler said.

“Umm sure, I’ll have a small gingerbread latte. Can’t spend too much time though, we’ve got a plane to catch.” Jamie reminded.

“Oh where are you off too?” Patrice asked, sounding innocent enough that even Brad gave him a look.

“Back home to Dallas,” Jamie said.

“Oh all the way across the country huh,” Patrice replied, starting on Jamie’s coffee. Brad nudged him in the ribs.

Tyler had a smirk on his face though. “Might have to try and come back more often though if you do indeed have the best lattes here.”

Brad and Patrice shared a look and Brad could tell Patrice was thinking about just dumping the coffee into the sink.

“I’m sure you can find better ones in Texas,” Brad replied.

Tyler laughed.

They finished the lattes and joined Charlie at the fireplace, chatting and getting to know each other when Jamie declared. “Okay we really need to be going.”

Standing up, Brad gave Tyler a hug, murmuring is his ear, “You guys get married. I want an invite.”

Tyler grinned at him. “Well of course.”

“Have a safe trip,” Patrice said, and then they were gone.

Patrice let out a sigh of relief as the door swung shut. And then all three jumped as a symphony of noise came from the till as it started back up.

*****

The door popped open and Pasta tumbled into the stairwell, from where he had been sitting against the locked door. He was surprised for a moment but then scrambled to his feet and went up the stairs as quick as possible, crashing into Tuukka at the top. They would have both fallen had Tuukka not steadied him.

“Have you been down there all this time?” Tuukka asked.

“I never thought I was getting out of there!” Pasta exclaimed, enveloping Tuukka in a giant hug. And to his surprise he didn’t immediately try and escape. “And then the fire alarms started going off and what if there was an actual fire and no one...”

But Tuukka shushed him before he could finish that thought. “I’d never leave you behind.”

All of a sudden he realized what he had just said and clearing his throat, he tried to pull away.

But Pasta was looking at him with big eyes a smile spreading its way across his face.

“I...” Tuukka had nothing. “Want to come help me in the kitchen? I seem to be behind.”

Pasta nodded, surprised. No one got to help Tuukka in the kitchen. No one. And he wondered if that meant what he thought it did.

*********

 “Well that is excellent news,” Zdeno said as he spoke to the apparently new owner of the building. The new owner that wasn’t raising the rent and was apparently a big fan of their little cafe. And was very happy to have them stay for as long as they wanted. He thanked the new owner, inviting them to come by anytime for a coffee on the house and as he hung up he wondered what had changed.


End file.
